BA - Cathay Pacific ?

[Oilandgasman]

Reuters reporting Cathay Pacific interest in BA with latter's share price up 4.3%
LONDON, Oct 22 (Reuters) - Shares in British Airways (BAY.L: Quote (http://uk.reuters.com/stocks/quote?symbol=BAY.L), Profile (http://uk.reuters.com/stocks/companyProfile?symbol=BAY.L), Research (http://uk.reuters.com/stocks/researchReports?symbol=BAY.L)) jumped 4.3 percent in a weak market on Wednesday on market talk that Cathay Pacific (0293.HK: Quote (http://uk.reuters.com/stocks/quote?symbol=0293.HK), Profile (http://uk.reuters.com/stocks/companyProfile?symbol=0293.HK), Research (http://uk.reuters.com/stocks/researchReports?symbol=0293.HK)) was planning a bid, traders said.
British Airways said it did not comment on rumour and speculation.
British Airways shares were up 5 percent at 148.8 pence by 1529 GMT, the top gainers on the FTSE 100 benchmark .FTSE (http://uk.reuters.com/business/markets/index?symbol=gb%21ftse), which was down 4.5 percent.
"A bid by Cathay Pacific for British Airways makes sense ... BA has a huge network in Asia that it could just replace with Cathay Pacific's," an analyst said, although a second analyst added that current rules dictate that non-European Union investors cannot own more than 49.9 percent of an EU airline. (Reporting by Sitaraman Shankar and John Bowker; Editing by Paul Bolding)

[Re-Heat]

A jump of 4.3% is hardly a bid offer-sized jump.

I would disregard any likelihood of this, not to mention that they are unable to control the business.

[christep]

Cathay might not be able to, but Swire (their parent) could.

[no sponsor]

Yes indeed. The Swire Group is a UK company is it not?

[Skylion]

Yes, Swire are a UK company so there would be no nationality impediment to their taking control of BA.

Re the other comment that BA has a huge network in Asia, that is not correct. In fact it is much depleted with SEL,OSA,NGO, TPE, MNL, KUL and JKT all having being abandoned over the last 10 years. BKK is treated much as a technical rathert than commercial stop on the Australian route and so is SIN on one of the 2 daily services there. The turf has been largely vacated to the One World members QF and CX although BA makes hardly anything out of the codeshares and the joint operation with QF has virtually eliminated the BA brand in Australia.

[Krueger]

B$%&ht, this is a fake news to raise the price of BA, so Iberia doesn't get a big share out of the intentional merger. We've all been reading that Iberia was going to get a bigger share because BA value has been sliding due to it's debt with pensions, etc.

Gosh, I fed up with freakin speculators.

Check Six, Krueger....

[renfrew]

Swire group are no longer the majority shareholder in Cathay Pacific.I think there is a big Chinese interest.

[Re-Heat]

1 Swire Pacific, Ltd. 39.98%
2 CITIC Pacific, Ltd. 17.49%
3 Air China Ltd. 10.15%
4 China National Aviation Company Ltd. 7.34%
5 Northern Cross Investments Limited 3.25%
6 Orbis Investment Management Limited 1.17%
7 Mellon Capital Management Corporation 0.94%
8 JF Asset Management (Singapore) Ltd. 0.48%
9 First Trust Portfolios L.P. 0.47%
10 DWS Investment GmbH 0.42%
11 Barclays Global Investors, N.A. 0.30%
12 China International Fund Management Co., Ltd. 0.26%
13 INVESCO Asset Management Limited 0.23%
14 LBB-Invest 0.20%
15 Pictet Asset Management Ltd. 0.19%
16 Norges Bank 0.16%
17 State Street Global Advisors Asia Ltd. 0.15%
18 Vanguard Group, Inc. 0.15%

[moosp]

And I'm sure that Larry Yung might be persuaded to sell his stake for a small premium now that CITIC have declared a loss of a couple of billion USD on unauthorized currency dealings in Oz dollars. They are trying to sell all sorts of assets this week.

[tornadoken]

Puff. Closer co-operation, yes, as OneWorld moves towards scale-benefits, such as in procurement, onway to the logic of one integrated franchise. Equity investment, no. Why would a China-orientated team do such a thing? Since 1860 Swire has attended to business far from Liverpool; if Beijing should perceive some political benefit in a Board presence in a big Western carrier, track record is of buying in distress situations - an Alitalia: now there's a rumour.

[Oilandgasman]

Reuters now reporting that Cathay Pacific deny any interest in BA.
End of rumour.

[hamsco]

What utter nonsence. Who are the idiots (or media) who insist on posting such tripe on this website? They should be bannished !